Where Monster Meets Man
by Story Please
Summary: Severus Snape has been tasked by Headmaster McGonagall to find a group of wayward professors after they go camping in the Forest of Dean. What starts out as a routine extraction gets...complicated...especially when Severus finds himself face to face and heart to heart with a monster out of obscure myths and legends.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note** : A fluffy little diversion for Corvus while she's recuperating in the hospital. May this help to give you the strength you need. 3

I was going to do this as a one-shot, but it's getting a bit too long for me to keep it as one chapter. Expect two to four chapters at the very most.

* * *

 **Chapter 1: In the Woods, There Be Monsters**

Severus Snape scowled at the dog-eared map in his hands. He'd been traveling for more than five hours and his feet were growing increasingly sore.

"Damn Potter and his damnable friends!" he hissed angrily, casting another Cushioning Charm on his dragonhide boots.

It had been three weeks since Professors Potter, Granger, Longbottom, and...Quidditch Commenter Weasley...were supposed to have returned from their yearly camping trip to the Forest of Dean. Severus wouldn't have worried about it normally, but Minerva had insisted, as the school year was about to start in a few short weeks. As Headmistress, she couldn't leave Hogwarts due to the heavy summer workload in preparing for the incoming students in the fall, but Severus Snape, Potions master and self-professed shut-in had no such duties. Though he'd grumbled and griped, he finally relented. Which was why he was standing on a dusty dirt trail that was more of a deer track than a proper pathway looking for a group of former students that had always given him no end of trouble.

It was nearly dark by the time he'd oriented himself on the map, so Severus reluctantly set down his pack and began setting up camp. He cast a few wards out of habit, but he wasn't worried about being discovered. So far, other than a few birds and a skittish fox, he hadn't come across another living soul.

Just as Severus finished setting up a nice little sausage roast on his modest campfire, a terrible thrashing noise echoed through the forest. Severus was immediately alert, his wand drawn as he extinguished the fire. Wearing all black had its perks, and he melted into the darkness of the forest, his eyes slowly adjusting to the lack of light. The sound grew closer, then further away, and Severus found himself growing irritated instead of unnerved. His sausage would probably be cold by the time the damn thing showed itself. Finding this thought unbearable, he began to slowly make his way towards the noise.

He stopped abruptly as he approached a large clearing, its contents lit up by the waxing moonlight as though it were midday. It was obvious from the snapped and broken trees that it wasn't a natural clearing, though, and the heaving sides of the creature that stood, its body largely encased in something dark and glittering, made it obvious exactly what had caused it.

The creature was about the size of a tiger, but it stood taller than he did, with a long, horse-like face and impossibly long, tufted ears that fanned out and flattened as it snarled and snapped at the dark thing that twisted around it like a smoky snake. Its body was long and serpentine, and it appeared to be covered with dark downy fur that shone like a metallic oil slick as its tiny clawed paws clicked together and dug at the earth below it. The tail was long with pontes plates at the end that twitched and reshaped into a spiked club, which thrashed around, splintering a nearby stump as the creature bellowed and screamed in an almost human-like manner.

"Is that...an _Anoroth_?" he whispered, his eyes widening in shock. Even in a world where centaurs and unicorns were well-documented, the Anoroth was supposed to be mythical- the sort of thing that idle wizards told tall tales about after one too many firewhiskeys. Legend had it that their feathery fur and nail clippings could enhance potions without changing how they reacted in the body, and kept them fresh for far longer than normally possible. Many crackpot "cures" bragged that they had fossilized Anoroth traces mixed in, but Severus had always known they were bullshit.

The creature's large, slitted eyes darted over to where Severus was standing in the darkness and for a moment, Severus froze. The Anoroth opened its mouth, revealing three rows of serrated teeth, its long, notched tongue testing the air for a moment before the black smoky thing that surrounded it seemed to squeeze against its body and it began to struggle once more.

On one hand, Severus knew that the Anoroth was supposed to be incredibly dangerous- its tail could slice through steel and its rotating rows of teeth were known to tear into its prey like a meat grinder. But he also knew that the creature was being harmed- the side of the Anoroth was dark with bright blue blood, and he knew that it was weakening, which would not do.

For Severus also knew that dead Anoroth lost their potency. Similar to a unicorn, the creatures could choose to gift their feathery fur, their nails or teeth (which were similar to a shark's in how quickly they regrew), but forcing materials was said to be inviting death upon oneself.

Severus only had a moment to think about what he was about to do before he sped forward into the clearing, his wand raised.

When the Anoroth saw him, its ears perked up and its hackles raised as it hissed menacingly at him.

"I'm not here to hurt you," he said, trying to keep his customary disdain from his voice.

The deep, thrumming purr-growl and bared teeth he received in return was not encouraging.

"I'm going to free you," Severus continued, keeping his eyes on the flashing blade-tail and using a soft, even voice. "I promise to only hurt the spell-construct that's trapped you."

The creature's eyes were still slitted, but it's mouth closed slowly and it regarded him silently.

"It's as I thought," Severus said, casting a diagnostic spell on the smoky mass that encircled the creature, pinning its wings down at its sides. "Odd, it's similar to the spell the Dark Lord used on Nagini…"

His neck scar ached as he said the name, but he ignored it.

Making an exaggerated backwards "S" and spoke the words to the counter-spell. " _Stellus Exitus_ _Ventilabus_!"

With a sound like grass shattering, cracks of light appeared around the darkness and the smoke dispersed into nothingness. Severus frowned as he heard what sounded like a scream of fury from very far away, but he didn't have much time to think about it, as the Anoroth was shaking its long neck back and forth and coo-humming with what sounded like happiness. Impossibly large wings unfurled from both sides, nearly filling the clearing as it stretched them and beat them slowly up and down, sending a shockwave of wind around its body.

Large, amber eyes opened and turned to stare at him, the slits of pupil growing round as they stared deeply into his eyes. Severus found himself stumbling at the sheer magical presence of the freed beast. Power rolled off her in waves and he had to force himself not to gape at her in wonder. He watched in stunned silence as her wound knitted back into whole flesh in mere seconds.

 _She is...magnificent._

Though he didn't know how he knew, he could tell that she was female. He dared to blink and when his eyes opened only a fraction of a second later, she'd moved silently to stand only inches away from him. Rather than fearing for his life, Severus looked up at her with wide eyes, raising his hands to cup the long, soft sides of her muzzle. She lowered her head and pressed her forehead gently against his.

Severus knew he should flinch and run away, but he found himself frozen. Rather than feeling fear, though, he was filled with a warmth and elation that he'd never felt before. Her ears swiveled and fanned out like miniature peacock displays on either side of her head and she coo-hummed with a pure joy that made Severus crack the tiniest hint of a smile.

"So, then, now that's taken care of, I'll bet you're hungry, eh?" Severus surprised himself at the affable words that escaped his mouth.

"Nrrrrrppp!" He received an overly-enthusiastic head bump in reply.

Lighting the tip of his wand, Severus led the way back to his campsite. A part of him wondered if he was slowly going mad. After all, legend did say that the Anoroth was known to attack humans, but for some reason, Severus couldn't bring himself to feel suspicious of the creature's intent.

The campsite was undisturbed, but Severus wasn't taking any chances. He easily doubled the strength of the wards so that neither he nor his new guest would be easy to find, even by other wizards or witches. Something told Severus that he had stumbled into something far more insidious than a bunch of slackers skivving off on their duties.

The spell that he'd seen surrounding the Anoroth was worrying. Not only did it dredge up a number of unwanted memories, but he'd been the one tasked with creating the spell to keep Nagini safe, and he'd taught it to the Dark Lord in the strictest confidence, due to the despot's increasingly pronounced paranoia near the end of the war.

The spell was never made to contain such a large creature, but it had certainly kept the Anoroth from flying. Severus stoked the fire and resumed cooking the sausages on autopilot. His mind was so focused on increasingly grim thoughts that it took him a moment to realize that both of the ends of the skewers he'd used to dangle the sausages over the fire were now engulfed by a somewhat smug-looking Anoroth.

"Shoo!" Severus shouted, pulling the sticks from the creature's mouth with a wet popping noise. "Those weren't even fully cooked!"

"Nrk nrk nrk!" clicked the Anoroth in reply, moving her head from side to side as though mimicking speech.

"Bloody menace," Severus muttered, Scourgifying the skewers and reloading them with frozen sausages. "You'd better give me some feathers and claw clippings of your own free will, or I'll stuff you and give you as a start-of-term gift to the DADA professor!"

Her expression was bored and he almost could have sworn that she shrugged at him before she yawned, exposing the three rows of teeth and turned three times around before lying down, extending one wing to rest her head on like a pillow.

Severus found that she was rather sneaky after she stole five more sausages from under his nose. Finally, he enlarged one sausage after cooking it and tossed it onto a plate for her to tear into. This seemed to do the trick, and she quickly curled up and fell fast asleep.

Severus snorted at the soft snores escaping her muzzle, but enjoyed an uneventful supper. Then, he covered her with a large blanket, though he told himself that he was being silly.

His dreams were warm and soft and he could feel those amber eyes watching him, protecting him.

"I can't just call you 'hey you' or 'Anoroth,' he said the next morning at breakfast. The Anoroth was in the middle of devouring a giant bowl filled with scrambled eggs, but she paused mid gulp and made a happy noise that Severus hoped was one of agreement. "And so, since I have absolutely no sense of creativity, and your eyes are your most prominent feature, I've decided to call you...Amber."

The creature paused and regarded him with skeptical eyes and a snort as if to say _is that really the best you could come up with?_

"What, then, would you like me to call you Sausage-breath?" Severus replied sardonically. "How about Toothy? Spot? Maybe you'd prefer to be called _Glutton, hmm_?"

The Anoroth snorted and bared her fangs.

"I see. Then Amber it is. At least until you learn to bloody talk." Severus turned away with a mild look on his face and made a show of doing the breakfast dishes, but he almost expected to find himself pounced upon by the deadly creature.

When he turned to face her again, she was halfway through with the salmon he'd placed on her plate earlier, her expression one of happily sated hunger. She even had the decency to look embarrassed when she let out a decidedly fishy belch.

It was only when Severus finished his own breakfast that he found himself surrounded by a large, purring Anoroth. Somehow, the late August chill in the air could not compete with the thrumming warmth of such a magnificent creature. With a dextrous, clawed paw, she plucked a handful of feathery down from where it grew over her chest. They regrew almost immediately, but Severus could see the oil-slick sheen of the feathers as they fell into his pale hands. Conjuring up a flask, he gently placed the offering inside and sealed it immediately to preserve the freshness of the gift. Then, Amber ran a claw over one cheek, drawing a thin line of blood. She angled her head over the flask that Severus had conjured up, dripping a few precious drops of her blood into it before the wound closed up and healed.

"I can only imagine that this is goodbye, then?" Severus asked, finding himself strangely choked up about the prospect of being left alone again.

She shook her head.

"Krrrrk," she replied solemnly, nipping the hem of his sleeve gently with her teeth and pulling him towards a path to their left.

"Are there...more of you?" Severus knew this had to have been a distinct possibility, but he had hoped to be wrong.

She nodded. "Krrrrr."

Severus knew he should continue looking for his original quarry, but he couldn't bear to leave such a rare and obviously intelligent creature to fend for herself, especially if there were others trapped due to a spell that _he'd_ created.

"I have to think about it." Severus turned to the tent and began the process of breaking camp.

She waited patiently behind him, but he knew they both already knew what his answer would be.

"Very well," he said, once he was ready. "Let's find your family."


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: So my brain is basically fried from having to deal with a dead father-in-law and all the bullshit tied to that, but here I go with the writing thing again…

* * *

 ** **Chapter 2: The Mind of the Matter****

Severus Snape considered himself a simple man with simple needs. All he needed was a good book, a comfortable, quiet place to relax, and the lack of any expectations being placed upon him by meddlesome individuals named Albus Dumbledore.

Or dunderheaded students.

 _Especially_ dunderheaded students.

Severus had only really stayed on at Hogwarts because he honestly couldn't think of anything else he could reasonably do for a living. Trying to open an apothecary was an exercise in futility, as the public was gravely divided over considering him a hero and wanting his head on a pike even though it had been years since Voldemort had been defeated. Though it was not perfect, the other professors treated him the same as they always had, and the students got over their initial starstruck reaction once the reality of his stringent expectations hit them. Besides, with _the_ _one-and-only Harry Potter_ teaching Defense, Severus found his own celebrity overshadowed rather quickly.

Which was just fine with him.

Professor Granger taught Transfiguration, but she was good for a laugh or a debate now that she was a fellow professor and no longer a student. Severus found that even Potter didn't grate on his nerves nearly as much, and he'd found himself carried away more than once in a discussion about various Dark creatures and the proper methods one might use to defeat them. Professor Longbottom still steered clear of Severus, but at least he was no longer blowing things up. And, as Herbology Professor, Severus did have to admit that the man knew how to make his plants flourish. His potions ingredients had never before been so fresh and vibrant. Plus, as an added bonus, Longbottom was kind enough to be nowhere near the greenhouses when Severus went to gather ingredients for his stores. It was quite a relief from the endless chatter that Poppy had subjected him to for years. The fact that Severus was pretty sure that Longbottom was somewhat terrified of him was just a bonus.

Severus didn't have much of an opinion either way on Weasley- he and his sister had both chosen careers in Quidditch, which he had exactly zero interest in other than the possibility of his House winning enough to get the House Cup simply so that Gryffindor wouldn't have it.

He felt a small twinge of guilt for abandoning his primary objective in lieu of helping a dangerous and supposedly mythical creature, but he was also beginning to think that perhaps Amber's appearance wasn't wholly disconnected from the disappearance of the others.

"Krr," Amber growled from where she padded next to him, her ears fanning shut and sticking up straight in the air as she listened intently. Her pupils narrowed down to slits, and Severus could see her muscles tensing under her downy fur.

Severus drew his wand and listened intently as well. A strange whining noise was filling the air and as he turned his head, a ball whizzed by his face, missing him by mere inches. Severus rolled out of the way out of well-practiced habit and pointed his wand at the object, which had slammed into Amber's side with the force of a wrecking ball, exploding like a bomb. She'd collapsed on her side, but she soon stood, and as he watched, the same smoky, starry substance began to wrap around her body. She snapped and tore at it with little effect.

Before he could even begin to move, another ball exploded through the forest with a screeching whine and slammed into her, encasing her even more fully in the smoke. She began to float in the air, her muzzle wrapped shut by glittering darkness.

This would not do.

Severus cast two bouts of the counterspell in rapid succession. He was unsure if he needed to do it twice since there had been two attacks, but the effect was instantaneous. The spells dissolved with a scream of fury, and Amber was free again. Severus immediately ran to the Anoroth, who was panting heavily, two prominent dents on the left side of her body that looked rather serious. He threw up a number of wards around them both in a small circle just in time to confuse a second set of the whirring, flying spheres. They circled around, seemingly looking for their quarry before whining away through the forest, presumably to continue searching.

Amber was breathing in shuddering, shallow breaths, her eyes unfocused with pain. She made small, almost word-like sounds, but it was as though her mouth were shaped incorrectly for them to be understood. Severus immediately dug in his bag for the vials of healing potion that he'd packed. Minerva had chided him for bringing so much Dittany and healing balm, but Severus knew that it was far better to be prepared, than it was to need it and not have it.

"I'm not sure how effective these are on mythical creatures, but I guess we'll have to find out," Severus muttered, feeling silly for talking to a creature that could probably not understand much of what he was saying due to the pain she was in. First, he poured a healing potion down her throat, massaging her long neck to ensure that she swallowed it, and then spread the healing balm against her side. Then, with a practiced twist of his wand, he began chanting the bone knitting spell he'd used on himself so many times before. Soon, Amber began to breathe more easily, her painful moans growing less plaintive. Severus pulled out the blanket he'd used the night before to cover her body and wrapped her up in it. After deliberating for a few minutes, he pitched his tent over where she was lying so that she'd have a roof over her head, as the increasingly cloudy sky was threatening rain.

Casting a Cushioning Charm, he sat on the floor of the tent with her, resting her head in his lap and stroking her soft head and behind her ears. She seemed to enjoy his ministrations and made a happy purring noise that filled his chest with a curious throb. Finally, when she'd fallen asleep, Severus gently placed her head on the soft blanket and went to lie down as well, for healing charms were very draining, especially for the level of damage that had been repaired.

* * *

Severus woke up to the feeling of something very warm and soft tickling him on the nose. He sneezed himself awake and sat bolt upright in the bed when he realized that it had been co-opted by a very large and very healed sleeping Anoroth. Her head was resting on his belly and one of her long ears had unfanned in her sleep, causing the very tip to tickle his nose. Her tail snaked under his pillow, which basically meant that he was nearly encircled by the creature. Oddly enough, it felt rather soothing, though he hated to admit it.

" _Hey_!" he choked out as another tuft twitched and filled his mouth.

Amber opened one large eye and then shut it again.

"I mean it-mrfffff!" he continued, receiving another ear tuft in the face. "You did that on purpose, didn't you?"

She yawned wide in response and fixed him with a look.

"You _did_ , I know it!" he accused, shaking his finger at her.

She made a bunch of clicking, growling noises in rapid succession as though in reply, and Severus was once again struck by how human-like her mannerisms were.

"Wait...no, it can't be." Severus frowned as a disturbing thought occurred to him. He'd been thinking about it on and off ever since he'd freed her from the attack, but now. She seemed overly comfortable being tended to with magical potions and spells, which made no sense, especially since the Anoroth was mythical. But even if he ignored that, he couldn't ignore the fact that any Anoroth spending an extended period of time around human beings, Muggle or magical, would have drawn massive amounts of attention in both worlds.

Things simply weren't adding up.

Severus knew that there were a number of possible explanations, but he knew they didn't have the luxury of much time to figure it out for certain. It was well known that using Legilimency on non-human beings had the potential to backfire horribly, and this was doubly so with intelligent magical beings that had never been documented in the wild. He'd read a number of cautionary studies about various wizards and witches that did similar things to force a familiar bond on an unwilling subject and soon found themselves batting at a ball of yarn on the floor. Still, if he waited and it turned out he was right to begin with, then he'd be utterly furious with himself for not doing it sooner.

"The most important thing is to get her consent," he muttered to himself.

Amber stretched her neck out and gave his arm a sharp nip as though to say _don't talk about me like I'm not here._

" _Hey_!" Severus rubbed his arm, but he could see that it hadn't broken the skin. "Well, since you asked for it, you naughty sausage glutton, I'll let you in on my idea. I want to, well, for lack of a better phrase, read your mind and see if I can bridge this pesky language barrier."

Amber stared at him, her whole body utterly still.

"The problem is that, ugh, why am I even explaining this to a magical beast- _ow_!" Severus grabbed his arm as he received another nip and a snort of annoyance for his troubles. "Fine! You know what? I'm not going to bother explaining it to you after all. The only thing I really need is your consent, and though I cannot promise it will be painless, I will promise that I will do my best not to hurt you."

He held out his hands and waited, hoping that he hadn't overstepped her boundaries.

She regarded him silently for another long moment before she bowed her head, pressing the underside of her jaw against his palms and keeping her eyes steady with his.

"Krr," she purred softly, sending a thrill through his body as she fixed him with her unblinking stare.

"Thank you," he breathed, though he didn't know exactly why he was feeling so off-kilter and worked up about this. After all...it wasn't like…no, he could think about that later.

'Focus, Severus,' he thought to himself.

"Legillimens."

* * *

Her mind was chaos. There was pain and then flashes of light flying in from all directions. He could smell the terror in the air as she ran. Others were near her, their voices human and scared, but they were distorted as another flash of light bombarded a tree and it exploded, sending shattered bits of wooden shrapnel out into the air around it. Severus was inside of her head and he could feel the impact from her fall to the ground, her leg suddenly useless. Shock set in quickly as her gaze shook and swam before him and Severus could see a large piece of a branch had pierced through her calf, the torn flesh on each side puckering and folding out like a fresh rip on a pair of jeans.

Her leg in the memory was hairless and very human.

Severus had to take deep breaths so as not to be sick, and considered this new information. He only had a moment, though, for a red light lit up his field of vision and everything went black.

Severus floated in the darkness of her mind, reaching out for something, anything. He could see a shadowy figure in the distance, but when he reached it, he realized it was a woman wearing the Anoroth skin over her body, her face obscured by a wooden mask covered with jeweled scales.

"Who are you?" Severus asked, his voice echoing in the darkness.

"You know me, yet you do not truly know who I am, do you, Severus Snape?" The voice that echoed back was at once familiar and feral, both feminine and fearsome.

Severus looked at her, trying to catch a glimpse of her eyes from the dark holes in the mask.

"I don't understand," he replied as she reached her clawed hand up and cradled his cheek.

"Is that really true?" Her voice was a whisper, and it came from everywhere around him, not just from where she stood before him. "Or is it that you do not wish to understand?"

She stroked his cheek and he couldn't help but lean into it, even though he knew, logically, that this was all in his head. Well, technically, it was her head, but the important point was that it wasn't _real_.

It felt real. It felt more real than anything had in a long while.

"If you stay here, you will find the answers you seek," she said, sadly, dipping up her mask just enough so that he could see her dark, full lips underneath. "But you risk binding yourself to this place in the heart of my mind."

Severus could feel her mind shifting and a new memory was swiftly coming into focus, even as he realized the truth of her words.

The problem was, he was finding it hard to care.

There was something in the warmth of her touch, and the proximity of her body, regardless of the form it was in, that calmed him and made him feel secure. Though he'd known her for less than a day, Severus knew that he could no more leave her mind than he could abandon the Anoroth to the mercy of whatever evil monster that was using those blasted spell constructs.

"Show me," he whispered back.

"Thank you, Severus," she whispered back, her lips whispering against his cheek as she stood on tiptoes, finally pressing them against his skin.

Severus gasped. It was _so_ warm. His heart thudded in his chest from very far away and he felt a swooping sensation in his belly.

The image blurred into focus slowly and Severus watched as a cloaked figure wearing a very distinctive basilisk mask approached her from where she was sitting behind long, narrow bars.

A horrible hissing noise escaped the mask and Severus realized the figure was speaking Parseltongue.

"You will be the first," the voice rasped, switching to English. "After all, you're the Mudblood and therefore expendable."

Severus flinched and nearly lost his hold on her mind at the harshness of that slur.

Severus watched as silver chains were wrapped around her human body and she was levitated, still in shock and pain from her injury, to a stone circle, which was lit with columns of fire around its entirety.

He could hear someone screaming a name- a familiar name, but before he could focus on that, the hooded figure waved a wand and the metal chains lengthened and twisted around her ankles and wrists, holding her spread out on her back.

"Don't bother begging, bitch. I promise, this will hurt," the figure hissed, driving a dagger into her belly until only the silver hilt remained visible.

Severus screamed along with her, his mind only weakly registering that the figure was spreading some strange white powder around the wound and making a complex series of wand motions including an incantation in a language that he'd never heard before.

She was on fire- her body was burning with pain and Severus could feel her body changing, growing, rearranging. It was intensely, horrifically painful.

When it was all over, she lay, her body changed into the familiar oilslick downy fur of the Anoroth that Severus knew so well.

"Let us see how well you will go for on the black market, eh?" the voice hissed cruelly. "There's quite a few who are already looking forward to turning your insides into limited edition steaks and stuffing you for a private library. Oh, and just in case you get any bright ideas about escaping..."

With a flick of the wand and a familiar incantation, the dark glittering smoke encircled the Anoroth's body.

"Get some rest, Mudblood beast," the voice taunted as a barred gate was slammed in her face. "Tomorrow is looking to be a very profitable day for me."

Severus could have withdrawn from her mind, but he knew he couldn't. He knew that he had to see it through.

"Oh, that's right. I almost forgot." The figure turned back. " _Crucio_!"

Severus doubled over in pain until he was surrounded by darkness again. He was holding the figure tightly against him as she quivered with pain.

"Shhh, it's okay," he said, though he knew it was not.

He held her there, in the darkness between mind and reality, until she finally seemed to relax, her body dissolving away into nothingness.

Severus pulled himself from her mind gingerly, opening his eyes with one singular word already on his lips.

" _Hermione_."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: Unstable Connection**

Severus stumbled forward, his legs giving way under him. The air felt thick and muggy as he fell, his body tumbling in slow motion towards the ground.

Before he could hit the ground, though, something warm and dark and unspeakably soft wrapped around him, catching his fall.

"Ugh," he groaned, grasping his head in his hands. "It feels like my head was just trampled by a herd of hippogriffs."

"Krrrr," the Anoroth said softly, releasing him from her grasp. _I'm sorry, Severus. I tried to warn you._

Severus blinked. "Wait. Say that again."

"Krrr?" She cocked her head to the side. _Can you hear my voice?_

Hermione's voice echoed in his mind as though she was whispering in his ear.

He looked into her amber eyes and chuckled ruefully as a thrill ran through him. "That was you, wasn't it?"

She snorted and tossed her head. _I told you that a bond would form. That's why so many wizards choose magical creatures as familiars. It's third year knowledge._

Severus pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed deeply. "There are worse things."

She chirped and nipped at his fingers. _I'll take that as a compliment, I guess._

"Hey! No biting!" Severus flinched away.

 _You deserved it for acting like an arse._

"Don't tell me what I deserve!" Severus retorted. "You're the one who got transformed into a bloody mythical beast. I should have known it was too good to be true. I can't even have one summer without being dragged into some nonsense involving Potter and his ridiculous followers."

 _Harry is my friend. I don't follow him. Or anyone else, for that matter._ Hermione turned and raised her her head as though offended by his remarks.

"Call it what you like," Severus said with a sniff, "but you and Weasley have always followed him about getting up to mischief. And that's when Longbottom wasn't around to blow things up."

Hermione let out an irritated snort and spread her wings. _If you're not going to help me now that you know the truth, then I'll go do it myself._

Severus went still as a twinge of guilt rose in his belly. He realized he'd gone too far. "Don't be like that, Hermione. I never said I wouldn't help."

In truth, he'd been trying to figure out some way to stop the anger building in his chest- anger that was not his own. She hadn't been lying when she said that a link would form, and Severus was kicking himself for having risked it. But everything he said seemed to make her _more_ angry, not less, and he'd lost his head over it. It wasn't unreasonable that she'd done the same as well.

"I'm...new to this whole bond thing," he mumbled, finally, not looking at her. "I apologize for being cruel. You did not deserve that."

Hermione's wings tucked into her sides and she regarded him with a suspicious look. _Well, I suppose that's better than no apology at all. And I can tell that you meant it, so that counts for something._

"So, then, can you tell me more about the woman who did this to you?" Severus asked.

 _She's not much older than me, which is odd because she seems to know me, but I don't know her from school and she definitely has magic._ Hermione pawed the ground, turned around and lay on the floor of the tent, staring up unblinkingly at him.

"She tortured you." It was a statement, not a question.

 _Yes. She seemed to hold a grudge for something I don't remember doing to her. ._

A wave of the shame and fear she was feeling filled his mind. Severus had to control the urge to leap over and wrap his arms around her. He settled with simply reaching over to stroke the soft downy fur of one of her long ear tufts, which had quivered within reach. It was almost too much to bear to know how much she had suffered. He, too, had experienced the agony of the Cruciatus Curse many times, and he knew it never got easier.

"Did you see what she did to the others?" he asked.

Hermione shook her head. _We were ambushed one by one. Then she put us in different enclosures where we couldn't see each other. I could hear Neville, but it sounded like he was very far away._

"She could have accomplished that with magic, though," Severus said thoughtfully. "We'd have to go back to her camp in order to figure anything out for certain."

 _She has all of our wands. She also still has the others locked up. We'd be vulnerable._

"I know it's hard to think about, all things considered, but it seemed like she knew you. Do you, by chance, know who she is?"

Hermione shook her head, her long ears fanning out in agitation. _Her mannerisms seemed familiar, but I can't remember ever having met her. I couldn't place her face or her voice._

"What about others- did she have anyone helping her?" Severus asked.

 _One. I couldn't tell if the figure underneath was female or male, but they follow her around like a shadow. The entire body is covered in dark brown cloth, and the hands are wrapped tightly with linen. There's one singular, giant eye painted into the cloth where the face should be in silver. I never heard them speak._

As Hermione's' voice whispered in his mind, she moved quickly and wrapped her tail twice around his wrist. Severus suddenly had a very clear mental image of the shape of an eye painted in silver.

"It reminds me of the Egyptian Eye of Horus," Severus said, frowning as the image faded away.

 _I hadn't been able to place it earlier. Now that you mention it...you're right._

Severus smiled somewhat smugly at this. Though he was loath to admit it, he'd only ever won one or two debates with the Transfiguration professor, and most of them had been hard-fought. Hermione's love of knowledge was only second to her love of most people would have found her behavior tiresome, Severus found it rather addictive.

"How did they get the drop on you?" He phrased the words very carefully, doing his best to keep a neutral tone, but Hermione bristled at this and he winced slightly at the irritation she projected.

 _We'd just set up camp. Harry and Rob went to get firewood, Neville was starting on dinner and I was taking a shower._

Hermione made a strange growl-purr noise, and if Severus didn't know any better, he'd think that she was embarrassed.

"I'm sure it wasn't-"

 _I can't BELIEVE I was stupid enough to leave my wand in the bedroom with my clothing!_ Hermione's mind-shout was enough to send Severus stumbling back and he scowled at her.

"You're not going to change the past by deafening me from the inside out," he replied cooly. "What we need is a plan."

Hermione slumped down and rested her head on her clawed forepaws. Severus couldn't help but bend down and stroke the feathery down on her long, glossy back.

The purr that rumbled from deep within her chest made him almost forget for a moment that a human mind resided inside of the body of such a magnificent beast. He scratched between her shoulder blades and was rewarded with a mental sense of intense relief.

 _Nghhhh, that feels good, ahhh! Scratch there, yes, just like that!_

Severus grinned as he watched her back leg thumping up and down like a dog's. In his mind was a sense of satisfaction and pleasure that was not his own, but he found himself enjoying the shared sensation. He could get used to this.

Her ears fanned out and back as her eyes rolled back in her head.

"Just be glad that I'm the only one hearing you say such things," he purred with a smirk on his lips.

Hermione's eyes went wide and she went very still. _Wait. You heard that? You weren't supposed to hear that!_

Severus got the impression that she was blushing, though he was fairly certain that Anoroths were unable to do so.

"I have some preparations to make, so you should rest and recover as best you can for the next few hours. If possible, we should wait until the sun goes down, if only to be less visible when we go looking for the others." Severus gestured with his wand and several caldrons flew from the kitchen cabinets and arranged themselves on the stove.

 _Fine, but can I stay here and watch you?_ Hermione's eyes were eager, as though she was hoping to learn some sort of trade secret.

"Just don't get in the way," Severus replied, striding over to the small potions store he kept near the middle of the tent.

He didn't actually believe she'd be a hindrance, but he received a tiny thrill of glee at her disdainful snort. And, when he returned to the kitchen, his eyes widened at the sight of the feathers and claw clippings that lay on the counter.

Hermione looked sheepish. _I couldn't sleep, so I decided to help._

He couldn't bring himself to be mad at her, not after she'd decided to give him more of herself, _literally_ , to enhance his potions.

"You've already helped far more than you know," he said, hoping she didn't feel the surge of affection he'd begun to feel for her.

But, from the sensation of her nuzzling gently against his leg when he passed by some time later, he found himself rather hoping the opposite. There was something in her touch that grounded him, helping him to focus. And even though he'd always kept to himself, the isolation had never been comfortable for him to endure. He knew that part of it was the fact that, even though he now knew the Anoroth was Hermione, she was also still in a form that he found much easier to allow himself to be affectionate with.

Later, when the potions were cooling, he sat on the couch and she rested her head on his lap, purring deeply. He felt himself drifting off into a light sleep, and for the first time in a long while, he felt perfectly safe.

After all, with Hermione to protect him, there was nothing to fear.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: The Queen of the Dead**

Severus awoke to a strangely comforting sensation against his scalp. It reminded him of being little and how he'd grown his hair out long after learning that many of the most famous wizards had long hair as well.

"Your Da will have a conniption," his mother had chided him, but her voice was kind and she smiled as she handed him a cap she'd knitted and spelled with an Undetectable Extension Charm woven into it. "Just be sure to wear this when your father's home or Tobi'll knock you down."

They'd sit by the fire after he'd taken a bath in the evening, a fiercely proud four year old and his fiercely proud mother brushing his hair out with an old charmed brush until his hair was silky and shone like satin in the sun.

The brush had been silver, so it wasn't long until his father had found it and hocked it for some booze money. Severus had been so furious that he'd shouted at his father, who'd been nursing a hangover and cuffed him about the head for his trouble.

The unpleasant memory made him grimace.

 _Oh, did I hurt you?_

Hermione's voice cut through his painful thoughts, and he opened his eyes to see a long, bristled Anoroth tongue dart out followed by the calming sensation of his hair being gently groomed.

Severus closed his eyes. "And what possessed you to treat me like a mother cat treats her kittens?"

 _Do you want me to stop?_

There was a note of playfulness in her voice and Severus realized that she was probably sharing the pleasure he felt from what she was doing.

Damn. Lying was definitely not going to work, then.

"I must admit, I am getting...used to it," he remarked, allowing himself to yawn. Even though he knew the Anoroth had teeth sharp enough to cut through bone like butter, she was surprisingly gentle with him, and now that he knew that there was a mind behind the beast, he could feel his trust in her growing stronger. Even before he'd known, he'd had a strange, illogical feeling that she would never harm him. Now, though, it seemed to take on a strange quality that he couldn't quite place.

Hermione finished grooming him and Severus sat up, feeling quite a lot less disgusted about having Anoroth saliva in his hair than he probably should have. For once, his scalp didn't feel itchy and greasy, as it tended to do after a day or two without a shower.

 _Hee hee, you do look rather dashing after a tongue bath._ Hermione squinted her eyes at him like a happy cat and Severus found a semblance of a smile rising on his lips. Her words reminded him a bit of Minerva, who, he imagined, was probably still frantically sending out owls to all of the new students.

Hermione was different, he realized. Perhaps it was the fledgling magical bond between them, but there was also a familiar sense of kinship that he'd felt a bit when they'd spent time in each other's company back in the library or the staff room. Hermione was always doing research or spending time with her many coworkers who had also been friends while she'd been in school, which had led to him often feeling reticent to seek her out, but now that he thought about it, she'd spent a lot of time seeking him out for discussion or a game of wizard's chess that she very rarely ever lost.

'And now she's a bloody mythical beast,' he thought. 'Is there nothing that the great Hermione Granger cannot do?'

 _I heard that_. Hermione's mind voice wasn't angry, but she flattened and fanned out her ears impishly. _And no, I imagine that I can do anything I set my mind to._

"That's a good thing," Severus replied, crossing his arms, "because we're going to need a lot of luck to make this work."

 _You're not the one who has to play at being bait._

"Granted, but I'm also not a massive mythical beast."

Hermione snorted. _You always get me on technicalities._

* * *

Severus made very sure to pack away all signs of his camp. He even transfigured the ashes from the campfire into stones. Before leaving the site, he buried a bag of extra potions under a rock and then warded it strongly so that nobody but himself would know where it was. Hermione made an approving thrumming noise at his magical handiwork, and he could feel a sense of anxiety as she thought of her wand in the hands of the unknown witch.

"We're ready," he said.

Hermione nodded and bent down on her forelegs, beckoning him to climb up on her back.

"Are you sure you want to-?" Her large eyes fixed on him, daring him to tell her to stay behind. "Of course. I already know that you can't leave your friends behind."

 _You know me too well._

"Well, you are a bit...connected to my mind," Severus replied as he climbed onto her. The downy fur on her body made him feel as though he were sitting astride a cloud. A heavily muscled cloud that could eat him in ten seconds flat if it wished to do so.

Hermione's laughter echoed in his mind as she took off in a whoosh of large, glossy wings.

* * *

Severus Disillusioned them both fairly easily, but what was difficult was maintaining the spell. He kept his eyes closed and focused deeply on the spell, trying to keep them both as invisible as was possible. Hermione acted as his eyes, her ears swiveling like bats ears as she picked up on sounds from the forest below. He could feel her body tensing under him before her mind-voice called out to him.

 _Her camp is close. I can smell blood and hear the cries of magical creatures._

Hermione descended from the sky slowly, turning back on her flight path and silently touching down on the forest floor, her wings gathering up into her sides in one smooth motion.

Severus climbed down and sniffed the air. He, too, could smell blood.

The walked a short distance before they reached a slight rise. Beyond it was a small, oblong meadow near a small stream. Large cages with colorful wheels attached to them were laid out in a half circle like the remnant of an old fashioned circus train. Severus could see bars built into the far hillside as well. A dark-haired woman sat facing the opposite direction, her hands busy with something that she was manipulating on the table before her. The other person, the one wearing the mask that Hermione had described, was nowhere to be seen, but Severus knew there wasn't much they could do about that.

 _Are you ready?_ Hermione grinned, exposing her sharp teeth.

He nodded grimly and gestured at Hermione, who went left around the side of the meadow. He knew she'd wait to start the diversion until he'd made his way quietly the other direction so that he could find out where the others were located and subdue anyone who got in the way. Hermione didn't need to be Disillusioned any longer, for her dark, feathery fur blended in with the dark underbrush of the forest fairly well. He only hoped those hovering, whirring contraptions didn't show up again.

As he made his way around the side of the meadow, Severus would check on the woman at the table. She seemed to be writing something in a notebook, and Severus couldn't help but wonder why she was doing such things, especially to a number of decorated war heroes. Evil never really went away, Severus knew, but it seemed strange that it would crop up years after the war had ended and in such a strange manner. Surely it would be easier to simply kill or torture Potter or his friends rather than change them into magical beasts, not that Severus spent much time plotting anyone's untimely demise. He'd already been involved in far too many demises as far as he was concerned. Still, there was something about this situation that didn't quite make sense, and Severus was determined to find out why.

The woman put down her quill and stretched. There was something cruel and pouty about her expression, and Severus was hit with a sense of visceral revulsion, but he couldn't tell if it was because he'd watch this same woman torturing Hermione in her memories or if he'd seen it somewhere else. Her head turned and she looked out into the thick forest near where Severus was standing, half-hidden in shadow and still Disillusioned.

"Irt!" The woman cried out, suddenly, causing Severus to duck behind a tree and freeze, certain he'd been detected.

There was a strange, soft noise like the sound of sand pouring through an hourglass, and a soft voice replied. "You called for me, dear Wadjet?"

"Bring me the scrolls on the Sun Ceremony. I must have everything in place by tomorrow. Our little bird won't be much use to us after that."

"As you wish, dear Wadjet." Severus peeked out from behind the tree to see the covered figure standing next to the woman, the silver eye shining in the sunlight. In a moment the figure vanished, though it was different than Apparation. Where Apparation forced the body through space like pulling a bowling ball through a straw, the mysterious figure seemed to fade and blur before disappearing completely.

'Almost like a mirage,' Severus thought.

He hurried on his way until he was able to reach the far side of the meadow, which transitioned into a large, rocky hill. Individual barred doors were built into the face of the hill, but Severus could see at a glance that the closest ones were empty.

'Hermione, I hope you can hear me,' he thought pointedly.

 _Yes, Severus. I can read you loud and clear._

'Noted.' Severus looked over towards the slight rise that mostly hid the table and the small tent that the woman had been working at. 'I think that distraction would come in handy right now.'

A horrible crash came from the other side of the clearing and Severus heard the woman from before shouting angrily. He ran, forcing himself not to look at where the woman or her mysterious servant had been. Instead, he focused on the cells. Most seemed empty, but he found a strange creature that looked a bit like a turkey with a dog's muzzle and paws and a giant bulb growing out the back of it.

His eyes widened. A Bulbower was not supposed to exist, period. And yet, here one was.

"Were you human?" he asked, as the thing squeaked in terror and cowered under its bulb, which opened to reveal a giant blooming flower. "Well? Were you?"

The creature raised its head ever so slightly and nodded.

Severus knew he couldn't waste any time and merely blasted the lock off the cage. "Come on, then."

The creature scurried out behind him, wringing its forepaws together as it waddled on its back legs.

Another cage revealed a rather still-human-looking Ron Weasley, who was lying on his back on top of a cot with his hands behind his head.

" _Well_? Are you going to lie there moping all day long, or are you going to get off your lazy arse and come with me?" Severus asked, as he blasted the lock off.

Ron turned and looked at him and Severus could see at once that Ron was less human than he'd appeared to be at first glance. Small goat horns poked out of his red hair on both sides, as did goat-like ears, which flattened upon seeing the hated Potions master. Severus could see that Ron's feet had transformed into large cloven hooves, and Ron's eyes had gone a strange glowing green.

"The beard suits you," Severus remarked, indicating the curling red hair that framed the young man's face.

"Would you believe me if I told you it's new?" Ron replied, scooping up the Bulbower so that they could move more quickly. "I quite fancy it. The hooves, not so much. I feel like I've got a man behind me knocking coconuts together when I move."

"Would you believe me if I told you I don't really care as long as we get out of this _alive_?" Severus growled back, already regretting saying anything at all. "Now, where's Potter?"

Ron gulped. "That scary woman has him. He...she made us watch what she did to him. It was terrible."

"While I am sure that what she did was indeed terrible, I would rather know the basic details, since we're working on borrowed time," Severus replied shortly. "Where. Is. He?"

A horrible crashing noise followed by a scream and a bellowed cry echoed through the meadow from the opposite side. Severus could feel Hermione's pain as something struck her.

"No!" Severus cried, despite himself.

Moments later, however, Severus saw Hermione take wing and rocket into the sky, her ascent followed by only one of those strange, whirring objects from earlier. He watched as she flapped her massive wings and easily outpaced it, but it still followed doggedly behind.

The distraction was over, which meant that their borrowed time was up.

"We need to get our wands. The bitch has 'em in her tent." Ron ran ahead, and Severus almost hoped that the idiot would get blasted by a hex.

Somehow, though, Ron made it just fine into the tent and emerged with four wands grasped in his hand.

"Give me Hermione's wand," Severus demanded, once Ron returned to where he stood, holding the Bulbower.

"What? Why?" Ron looked at him suspiciously.

"Because she told me to hold it for her when we discussed our distraction plan!" Severus hissed back, holding out his hand.

Ron seemed to be somewhat shocked at this information, and he handed Hermione's wand to Severus as he glanced over to where the loud, frightening noises were echoing from the forest. "I see she's being both brilliant and scary as usual."

A strange sound filled the air for a moment, and a voice spoke softly and full of menace. "Do not resist."

Both Severus and Ron only had a moment to turn before a jet of red light flew towards them and they scattered to both sides. Severus found himself running with the Bulbower under one arm like a ridiculous parody of an American football player. Ron ran around a large pile of fallen rocks dodging a purple jet of light with a shout as he rubbed his bottom. Severus could see where a tiny goat tail was poking out of the back of his jeans, the tail still smoking.

But, to their combined horror, the masked figure in brown began to materialize before them.

Severus grabbed Ron roughly by the arm and did the only thing he could think to do just as the large silver eye melted into focus.

With a crack like the sound of a bullwhip, he Disapperated.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5: Trick of the Mind**

Severus immediately began to raise the wards around them the moment they appeared back in the clearing where he'd made his preparations earlier. Ron seemed to take the hint and began to raise wards and Notice-me-not charms on the other side of the clearing.

Neville waddled back and forth nervously in the middle of the clearing, tiny squeaking sounds escaping from his beaked mouth. It was both adorable and ridiculous, and Severus had to grit his teeth to avoid saying something snarky.

There were wards to focus on, after all….and….

 _Pain. Severus. Please. Help….me._

She was disoriented and he could feel her mind growing fuzzy around the edges.

 _Hermione, follow my mind-voice. Don't be afraid if you can't see us.. I've raised the wards already. Just keep following. This way. Yes. Perfect. Good girl. You're doing fine._

He watched the dark dot on the horizon grow closer, his mind broadcasting a stream of consciousness just to keep her on track.

 _Good...good...you can land here...you're almost done-_

" _Hermione_!" Her name escaped his mouth in a breathless shout as her wings folded in abruptly and she dropped out of the sky, her sides heaving and one eye closed tightly as she cried weakly in pain. Luckily, she had left the whirring objects behind her, but she was obviously injured.

He pointed his wand immediately at her body and cast a levitation spell, slowing her descent, but the ground still shook terribly upon impact and Neville flopped on his belly, the large flower popping out of the bulb on his back as he quivered with fear. Ron steadied himself on his hooves and continued with the wards with an irritated snort when Severus shooed him away.

"I'll tend to her. _I've_ got the potions, you daft boy!" Severus snapped, "You focus on closing the gap in the wards so those _things_ don't find us."

Ron did as he was told, but the sullen slouch of his shoulders suggested that he was not happy about it.

Severus didn't care. He had more important matters to focus on.

Hermione lay on her belly, her sides heaving. One of her sharp tail-blades was missing, and blood seeped from her body from what appeared to be a hundred tiny cuts. Severus held up the Dittany and Hermione tipped back her head, allowing him to administer it orally. Then he began working salve into her fur, attaching a cold compress over her eye, which was now swollen shut.

The blood began to slow and then dry. Severus used a few Cleansing Charms on her body to remove most of the matted blood.

 _You did well, Hermione._ He stroked her side and she began to purr softly even though her eyes were both closed. Her Anoroth healing appeared to accelerate the effects of his potions, and she soon opened both eyes with a slightly more energetic purr-chirp.

 _Good smell. Hungry! Food?_ She tilted her head as Severus placed a plate of sausage and a dish filled with cool water in front of her. He frowned for a moment. It wasn't the same as hearing her mind voice, but the feeling not only filled his head, but also made his stomach growl.

He chuckled softly as she dug into the meal.

"Bonds are apparently useful for something," he said, munching on a sausage of his own. "I knew almost immediately that you needed this."

She snorted. _I'd say it was fairly useful for more than just food, but right now food is all I can think about._

She finished quickly and gave him a guilty look as she nosed the bowl into his hands with an expectant chirp. Severus sighed with annoyance, but he went to gather together something else for her to eat, which turned out to be some fruit and cured meats that he'd been storing in his rucksack. When Hermione had finished eating, her downy fur seemed to shimmer with health and even her tail plate had nearly finished growing in as she slid them out and flattened them appraisingly. She butted her snout against his chest like an overgrown cat and let out a purr of pleasure. Her ears fanned open and then shut flat again and again.

 _You really are an absolute treasure. You know that, don't you?_

Severus snorted. "I bet that you say that to every bloke who gives you enormous quantities of food."

 _Don't forget. You healed me too._

"You healed yourself, more like," Severus replied, stroking her back and scratching her under her chin. "I just helped a bit. That's all."

Hermione fixed him with a look but didn't press the issue.

 _The witch...she's strong. She sent a couple of odd creatures after me. I've never seen them before. They're about the size of a goblin, give or take a foot. They had wings and falcon heads but their bodies were humanoid. Then there's the whirring things. I smashed a couple of them before they could encircle me in the spell, not that any of them tried. I think she might be trying to save her power, but I don't know how or for what purpose. It's complicated to describe._

Severus placed his hands on either side of her head and brought her head down so that he could rest his forehead against hers. He took a deep breath, taking in her distinctive clover and lemongrass scent, then opened his eyes.

"Hermione, please…" he said, "...let me _see_."

She let him slip into her mind again, and this time it was easier than before...it felt natural, like diving into water. This time, he stood in the darkness with Hermione standing by his side wearing her cloak of Anoroth skins. She nuzzled against his side, her hand seeking his as they watched the memory float into view. Hermione's view was somewhat shaky due to the fact that she was fighting off multiple creatures, but Severus could see where the small, bird-headed creatures crumbled to sand when Hermione closed her jaws around one of them.

"They're like golems," Severus said, stroking his chin. "Interesting."

But, before he could say anything else, a familiar sound made his belly churn with anxiety. A voice was hissing out familiar syllables.

"She's a Parseltongue? But...that's…" He stared at the defiant look on the witch's face as she sent powerful hexes at Hermione's Anoroth body that he'd never seen before.

The way her eyebrows twisted her face made his stomach churn with recognition. It was only in that moment that he finally realized where his vague feeling of recognition from earlier had come from.

"She looks like…" He paused, his throat growing dry.

"Bellatrix Lestrange," Hermione whispered from his side gripping his arm tightly.

"It can't be," Severus said, as the witch spoke something in venomous hisses and a giant snake the size and shape of Nagini shot from the end of her wand and missed Hermione by mere inches.

Hermione turned her head to look at him, her eyes wide. "Do you mean that V-"

"The Dark Lord and...Bellatrix...and….oh Merlin, no."

Hermione curled her body around to Severus' front and pressed her face into his chest. "I...I can't bear to look any longer, Severus."

He closed his eyes, wrapping his hands around her tightly and rested his chin on the top of her head.

"I won't let them hurt you," he promised, though he didn't know how, _exactly_ he'd keep that promise.

He lingered in the darkness with her, his long arms wrapped tightly around her as she buried her face against his chest.

"Severus," she said, looking up at him, her face in shadow, "If I become human again, will you hold me like this? It's...calming."

"Not _IF_ ," Severus replied with a sniff. " _WHEN_. _When_ you become human again."

"But... _will_ you?" Her voice was small, almost as though it was coming from far away, though he could hear the vibration against his chest.

"How could I not?" Severus replied, glad that she couldn't see the flush rising on his face. "It's bad enough that I find myself wanting to bury my face in your feathery fur. It's a good thing Albus is dead as a doornail or he'd never let me live it down!"

Hermione giggled, then, and he felt a small, wry smile lift up his lips at the corners.

"You don't see me as a monster, do you, Severus?" she asked, and he could feel the smile in her words. An insistent, pulsing heat bloomed in his chest to hear her say his name with that tone of voice.

"You never saw me as one either, even when I was doing my best to appear otherwise," Severus replied, chuckling softly in the back of his throat.

"What's so funny?" Hermione asked.

"It's simply a delicious irony that I could fool the Dark Lord for years with relative ease, but a bushy-haired Gryffindor could see right through me." Severus buried his nose in her hair. He knew that it shouldn't smell like anything, but there it was- a soft, chestnut and mint scent that somehow mixed together perfectly.

"Indeed. It is quite fortunate that Moldy Voldy never learned to harness the formidable power of teenagers and their uncanny ability to sniff out bullshit," Hermione snorted loudly.

"Merlin preserve us all," Severus groaned theatrically, but he couldn't hide his smile from her.

He knew that none of this was real, and that they desperately needed to regroup and save Potter (' _AGAIN_! Wasn't ONCE enough?' he thought bitterly to himself) from what was looking to be the daughter of the two most twisted magic-users the Wizarding World had ever known.

However, this did not stop him from sliding his fingers under Hermione's chin gently and lifting her face up to his, his eyes shining with the need to prove to her that the thrumming ache in his chest was real. He could feel her warm breath upon his lips as she stared up at him, her golden eyes unblinking, pupils blown wide with desire.

"Oh, yes, _please_ ," she hummed softly as he brought her lips to his.

The way she said _please_ made his breath hitch with need.

And, though the warmth and wetness he felt pressed against his mouth was most certainly just a trick of the mind, Severus found himself not caring one whit.

She wanted to be _his_ , and as his heart spun in his chest with wanting her, he knew with certainty that he would do anything that she asked of him.

Anything at all.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6: The Phoenix Rises**

After cleaning up and discussing the plan to rescue Harry, everyone turned in early. From what Ron had gathered from listening in on the woman (whose name was still unknown) and her unnerving, teleporting servant, whose name was Irt, they had been grabbing wizards and witches for the past few months, their menagerie never staying in the same place for long. They used a strange ritual with words that were very unlike the latin-based spells that were taught at Hogwarts to bind the magic of their victims to a bestial form. Because witches and wizards had magic, so too did they transform into magical creatures. Then, they sold them to the highest bidder.

"Harry was different, though," Ron said, as he angrily poked the fire. Neville snored softly nearby, the bulb on his back opening up to reveal a pale flower that began shimmering in the flickering light. "She had a plan for him. She's going to use him for something."

"What did he transform into, if you don't mind me asking?" Severus asked, less out of concern and more due to his sneaking suspicion that he was not going to like the answer.

"It's odd," Ron said, "Harry didn't transform the way that Neville did. He seemed to...fold in on himself...almost as though he was two dimensional for a moment, and then he unfolded into something impossible."

"Impossible...how?" Severus asked more tersely than he'd meant to be. "Come on, out with it, Weasley."

"Imagine a rip in the air in the shape of a gigantic...winged...thing-" Ron started, his cheeks coloring when Severus let out a derisive snort. "Oi, Snape! Don't laugh. It's not like I spend all day describing impossible things to people! Anyway, so...Harry...there were three eye-like slits with flames licking out from behind them, and other than a golden circlet around his neck, which the girl wrapped around with her wand, there seem to be two long tufted things that fly out behind his head, and his body...looks oddly flat from any angle- the darkness of his body seems to swallow the light."

Severus frowned. "Do you mind describing it in more detail?"

Ron ground one cloven hoof against the dusty ground. "I don't know how else to put it and I sure as hell don't know what it... _he_ became! I only know that whatever she's got planned for tomorrow is going to involve my best mate, and there's not much I can do about it in this stupid body. You saw how shite my wards were. Being transformed into a magical creature is affecting my spellcasting! Which I don't need because Harry needs me! And yet here I am, sitting around like a useless numpty when I should be going back there to get him!"

From where she lay with her body curled behind where Severus stood, Hermione tossed her head side to side and glared at Ron, her ears fanning in and out with annoyance.

"Even Hermione thinks you're being overdramatic," Severus said, shrugging as Hermione nodded her head in a very un-Anoroth-like way.

Ron wrinkled his nose. "And since when is it _Hermione_?" he asked, the bitterness filling his voice.

"Since we've worked together for a number of years as colleagues," Severus replied, deadpan, though this was at least a partial lie. He'd never dared to call Hermione by her first name even though they'd been working in the same place. No, that special intimacy was all due to their bond, which had become even stronger in only a few hours. Now, Severus and Hermione were consistently trading thoughts and mental images without much effort, if any. The funny thing was, even though Severus was keeping up his Occlumency shields after all that had transpired that afternoon, Hermione seemed to be, for lack of a better term, _immune_ to them.

 _Severus, you're incorrigible. Show a little sympathy, why don't you?_ _After all, it was I who dumped him, not the other way around._ Hermione whispered in his mind.

 _Well if he stopped acting like a git maybe I'd have some sympathy_ , Severus replied silently. _Besides, he was obviously stupid enough to make you want to be rid of him, so that's not exactly helping his case._

Hermione snorted again and Ron glared at her as well.

"It's like you two are having a silent conversation," he grumbled, crossing his arms. He stomped his hoof again, flattening down the robes over his body self-consciously. "Ugh, stupid insatiable satyr body. It's getting bad enough that I could probably go for an old lady with saggy tits right now."

"That is far more information than I would ever want or need to know," Severus replied with a shudder.

"Even though I hate that bitch for what she did to Harry, at least _she_ used me a couple of times, took the edge off," Ron whined. "Helped me to let off a bit of steam." He looked at Hermione and sighed. "Scales and feathers just don't do it for me, love."

 _You're sorely tempting me to bite you in a place that shouldn't be bitten._ Hermione bared her teeth and Severus had to stop himself from snorting with laughter.

"Keep it in your furry britches, Mr. Weasley, "Severus sneered, "or I may be forced to hex off your bits and pickle them in a jar. That is, if Hermione doesn't get you with her razor sharp teeth first."

Ron looked a bit green at this and grabbed his blanket from where he'd thrown it over a nearby folding chair. "I"m going to get to sleep, then," he said indignantly. "I'm sure even a nightmare would be a preferable to looking at your ugly mug."

"I assure you, the feeling is mutual," Severus deadpanned to Ron's retreating backside.

He pulled the blanket over Hermione, enlarging it two or three times with a charm so that she'd be completely covered. Just before he was about to head to his own sleeping quarters, Hermione grabbed his sleeve gently with her mouth.

 _Please...stay_ … Her eyes shone in the dying firelight, and he couldn't deny her request.

"Well, where should I sleep, then?" he asked, looking around.

Hermione rolled slightly to one side and gestured with her head. _Here should be fine. My feathers are soft._

Though ths was true, Severus wasn't completely convinced they'd be comfortable enough to sleep on until he climbed carefully onto her side and found that she was warmer and softer than any bed he'd ever slept in.

Severus was not proud to admit how tired he was, but he was growing too tired to care. He stilled and had fallen into a moderately deep sleep in moments, a soft snore emanating from his lips.

Hermione gently pulled the blanket up so that it covered him up to his chin and softly nuzzled his hair with her muzzle. Severus sighed with pleasure but he did not wake, so Hermione lay down and closed her eyes as well.

They slept peacefully until the sun rose.

* * *

"So, then, what's the plan again?" Ron asked in the morning. His mood seemed greatly improved if only because he knew that they'd be causing more than a little chaos against the villains that had humiliated him with such a bestial form.

"No plan," Severus said through a mouthful of sausage, which Hermione was unabashedly begging for. He tossed one high in the air and Hermione's neck extended like a whip, snapping the sausage into her mouth and swallowing it whole.

Neville clapped, his short little paws barely reaching around the wide, furry girth of his belly, while Ron merely rolled his eyes and skewered a sausage off the pan. He ended up eating three sausages quickly, swearing as the hot drippings burned his fingers.

"We are going to go in quickly and we're going to hit them hard," Severus said, once they'd finished. "There are too many variables that we don't know, but it seems like they're the only two involved, and surprise is going to be the most effective weapon."

Ron looked dubious, but after Severus pulled out a number of objects from his rucksack, the red-haired wizard seemed to concede.

"So you're saying that these things flash freeze on contact?" Ron asked, pulling out one of the orbs that was tucked into the bandoleers he'd placed over one shoulder and holding it up to the light.

"Yes. It's a special concoction of mine, and should bypass your pesky fluctuating magic problem," Severus replied. "Just don't hit one of us, and I'll consider it a raging success."

Ron scowled at this, but said nothing, and placed the orb back into its pocket.

"Also, it shouldn't need to be said, but there aren't an unlimited supply," Severus said tightly. "Make them count."

Ron grunted, his expression adamant.

Hermione bent down enough for Ron and Neville to climb on. Neville had Severus' rucksack attached backwards over his belly, since the bulb on his back didn't leave much room for anything at all. She chirriped at Severus, but he shook his head.

"I'll be dropping in the way we discussed. You know what to do."

Hermione nodded and spread her wings, causing Ron to grip Neville with one hand and Hermione's neck feathers with the other. Severus smirked at the squeak of terror that escaped Ron's mouth, and he suspected that Hermione was gleaning a measure of satisfaction from his terror herself.

"Well, here goes nothing," he muttered to himself, shivering involuntarily as Hermione's mind-voice whispered _Be careful, Severus._

* * *

The enemy campsite was much as it had been the day before, but there were wards completely surrounding it. Severus probed against one of the parts of the ward that pressed against the trunk of a tree and frowned. It was a partial dome ward, which meant that anyone entering from the sky could get through without detection. Throwing a rock at the ward, Severus found that it only extended about twenty feet up before it dissipated.

 _It's not suspicious. She...the Dark Lord's child is conserving her magic,_ he reminded himself. Unfortunately, his deeply held sense of suspiciousness refused to stop prickling at the back of his neck and Severus gritted his teeth, forcing himself to ignore it.

Severus silently cast his flying spell and flew over the ward-wall, pulling a piece of chalk from his pocket and drawing a very peculiar looking rune on it. It was like an eye, only with a spiral around it originating at each compass point and twisting around it. It shimmered against the ward and disappeared.

Severus smirked. The wards would fall and they wouldn't be any wiser until it was far too late.

An explosion shook the trees on the nearby hills and Severus began to move more quickly, sticking to the treeline instead of venturing out into the more open, meadowy area nearby. He cast a hurried _Point Me_ spell and scowled as he was forced to double back. He finally reached a wall that looked more like it had been made of mud and sand, and slowly peered around it.

He had to hold back a gasp of horror when he saw it.

The creature that Harry had become stood on a thick, wide perch that appeared to have been a tree at some point. The wings were raised up into points on either side of his body like a bat hanging upside down, but other than the golden circlet that circled his neck, which featured scales and a slitted ruby eye that gave Severus the impression of a snake biting its tail, he was almost utterly featureless. The blackness of his body seemed to roll impossibly in waves, but the distinction of his three-dimensional shape was impossible track, even in the bright early morning light. The darkness Harry was made of seemed at once endless and hungry.

It was the darkness of nightmares. A darkness that _should not exist._

Severus remembered Ron's words the night before. _He folded in on himself._

Four slitted, fire-filled eyes without pupils were distributed around Harry's head- two larger slits and two smaller where his forehead might have been. They did not appear to be fixed on anything in particular, but there was no real way to know. As he stared, Severus realized that he had no way of really telling the true mass of the creature outside of its unnatural height and wing-folded width, which unnerved him greatly.

He pulled the High Potency Shrinking Solution from one of his many hidden pockets and sloshed it around in a circle. Hopefully, this would be enough. He had not expected to shrink a massive creature-fied Harry Potter down to size.

He had not, in fact, _expected_ to use it at all. It was only the lingering paranoia from his spying days that filled him with a sense of over-preparation whenever he found himself faced with an unknown situation. And the fact that he'd once again needed to take advantage of such precautions did not bode well for the hope of one day weaning himself from the habit.

"Severus Snape. So it _is_ you, you old snake. My father told me many things about his most _faithful_ servant." The young woman with Bellatrix's curls and the sort of body language that suggested that she was adept at looking far less dangerous than she actually was stood next to the transformed beast that was Harry. She stroked his clawed foot absently. "He's beautiful, isn't he?"

"So it's true," Severus said, his voice flat. "Unfortunately, I do not have the pleasure of your acquaintance."

She giggled. "So formal, aren't you? Like an old fashioned muggle butler. Oh yes, I know about them. I know all sorts of things. I've had all the best tutors and teachers. You can call me Isis."

"Isis...as in Isis, the goddess-queen of magic from Egyptian lore?" Severus raised an eyebrow despite himself.

"Father always had an appreciation for ancient magic," Isis replied, smirking. "And who was more obsessed with the idea of eternal life than Egyptian royalty?"

Severus glanced at her pale skin. "You are not Egyptian, though."

"That means nothing, and you know it." Isis laughed. "At the height of her popularity, Isis had a well-frequented temple in the heart of London. I aim to follow in the footsteps of my namesake."

"You're joking." Severus let the words escape his lips before he could hold them back. He was definitely rusty when it came to holding his tongue around someone with the power to murder him on a whim.

She chuckled and shook her head as though he was being willingly shortsighted. "Don't worry, I won't make him kill you unless you try something funny." As she stroked the monstrous creature, he stretched his wings out, covering the clearing in shadow, and bent down, his molten eye slits growing rounded as they focused on his mistress.

"You're going to help me in the Sun Ceremony, aren't you my pet?" she said lovingly to the creature as it opened a jagged, beak-like maw and a bright red cloud of smoke began to billow from it.

"What is it you intend to do...with...it?" Severus asked, trying frantically to think of what to do next.

"I feel like I ought to ask you the same thing. Whatever do you want my little subjects for?" Her mouth curved into a predatory grin that was anything but friendly.

"They are not your subjects," Severus replied, "They are professors at Hogwarts and I have been sent to retrieve them."

"Surely you cannot expect a mudblood to be an adequate teacher!" Isis scoffed.

"It is not my job to make that decision," Severus replied. "As you know, the Dark Lord...was defeated. I must make my living as a professor. One of these duties is to follow the Headmistress's orders."

"You're still the same as you ever were," Isis said, shaking her head. She caressed the monster's beak and pressed against the razor sharp tip of it until she drew a red drop of blood. "Harry Potter was the one to kill my father, and so he shall be the key to my ritual."

"I saw the Dark Lord when he returned last time. He was...less...than he should have been," Severus said. "Even if you bring him back, it won't be him. Not really."

Isis stared at him for a long moment, and Severus got the impression that she was disappointed in him.

"I don't give a flying fuck about my father," she said, at last, her eyes flashing as her tight black curls bounced slightly around her face coquettishly. "At noon today, I'm going to bind myself to Harry here, and then he's going to help me to rule the world."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7: Bound and Determined**

Hermione snapped at the whirring creatures that were flying around her, grabbing hold of one as it swooped towards her face too sharply to dodge her mouth and crushing it between her jaws. She spat out the dust and debris with a disgusted snort and spread her wings again, shooting into the sky after the others.

Ron, with his Neville backpack, had dropped to the ground from Hermione's back and was throwing explosive phials at the assorted clay creatures that were shambling towards him. Irt was standing on the flat surface of a sheared-off tree trunk, holding a small golden crook in one hand and silently commanding them with various movements of the candy-cane-shaped implement. Hermione knew the shape well- grand viziers were sometimes known to carry them, which made them very powerful magical objects, often used by Egyptians in magical practices in lieu of the traditional wand.

The hood with the silver eye painted on it was unnerving- even though Hermione logically knew that there must be some way that Irt was able to track her movement, as evidenced by how well the remaining flying contraptions were following her. She roared with pain as one slid its whirring blade against her front leg and clipped the tip of one of her wings. Struggling to take control, she lunged and destroyed it, sending powdered remnants into the forest below, but it was too late. Her wing was dripping with blood, and she couldn't use it to maneuver with enough nuance to avoid the attack from the whirring things on her tail. One slammed headfirst into her on one side, pushing her into the other. There was a bloom of pain up her left side, and then she felt one of her wings detach just beyond the shoulder blade.

It was excruciating.

Hermione bellowed with such agony that everything seemed to go oddly silent. A rushing of air around her body reminded her that she was dropping out of the sky and she felt a tree snap as she slammed against it before landing in a prickly bush, her body sticky with sweat and blood. She struggled to get air in on one side, her heart thudding dully like a staccato drum solo.

'My lung is collapsed," she thought, before all thought fragmented behind the static of the pain from her injury even as her body began to knit back together again. She could feel the painful points of bone protruding from the base of her shoulder blade, stretching outward impossibly to regrow her ruined wing. Hermione lay still, not caring even when another explosion dropped the two whirring automatons from the sky as Ron shouted obscenities at Irt and her clay minions.

Her vision was wavering as Ron picked Neville up out of the bag and tossed him over to where she lay. Neville squeaked and patted her with his webbed paw, and Hermione tried to move even as she felt herself struggling under the weight of trying to breathe. It many long, agonizing minutes for her collapsed lung to refill itself with air, and she gasped weakly, feeling every bone knitting inside of her as Ron ran around wreaking chaos wherever he could to keep Hermione from being further targeted. Another whirring automaton tried to come close and Neville placed one of the explosive vials in the bulb on his back, turning and launching it out with a surprisingly adorable squeak. The glass shattered on impact and Neville squeaked with joy as the clay falcon head separated from the rest of the whirring, bladed body.

Dimly, she thought she could hear Severus whispering something to her, but as she fanned her ears out weakly, trying to raise her head, the whispers faded away to nothing.

Hermione knew she shouldn't close her eyes, not in the middle of a battle, but she'd lost a lot of blood and her body was already struggling to heal. Neville placed a webbed paw on her muzzle and patted it gently. The coolness of his touch was actually rather soothing and Hermione purr-chirped slightly through the whimpers of pain that shuddered through her.

It was as though he was telling her that he'd protect her- as ridiculous as that statement was, considering how unthreatening and, for lack of a better term, _adorable_ he was.

She slept.

* * *

"My father was a shortsighted bastard," Isis was saying, as Severus forced himself to remain frozen in place instead of running in the opposite direction towards where he could hear Hermione's mind calling to him. Hermione's initial mental cry of pain was almost enough to make him cry out as well, but he'd bitten his tongue and Isis hadn't noticed. "He always wanted immortality, but he never quite understood that in order to be immortal, one must do more than simply shave off a few bits of one's soul and call it a day. Don't you think?"

Severus nodded. "I had spoken with him about some alternative texts from Egypt back in my youth, but he was a very secretive man. We did not know about the horcruxes until much later."

Isis smiled, and Severus was struck by how charming and disturbing it was at the same time. That smile was, he thought, a perfect amalgamation between Bellatrix and Voldemort, though he could have lived his whole life without having to see it in the flesh.

"It is you that I have to thank for having been sent to study at the Hall of Wonders, then," Isis purred. "I knew that I made the right decision when I decided to let you live. Besides, I was getting a bit lonely with my dolls."

She pouted and batted her eyelashes at him, and Severus was struck by the unnervingly unsettling sensation that she was attempting to flirt with him. Perhaps a younger, more inexperienced man might be fooled, but Severus was neither of these things.

"I must admit that I am curious about your ritual," Severus said, trying to change the subject and draw out more information, "If it creates a bond as you say, surely you will be able to control the beast, correct? Will you use it to subjugate the masses with fear?"

Isis clucked at Severus and he flinched as she stepped closer to him and placed one finger against the tip of his nose. "That's too much like my father. So heavy-handed. So magical-supremacy-focused. There's a word for that. Bo-ring! I don't care about merely being at the top of the wizarding heap. I want to be the apex being and rise above the rest of humanity. I want to be the undying, all-seeing eye that watches and judges accordingly. I'll carve rivers and pull mountains from their earthen beds. I shall be a _god_!"

Her eyes flashed with mad excitement as she thought of her conquest, and Severus realized that she was quite a lot younger than he'd originally assumed. He'd always been terrible at guessing age, but her face and willingness to spill her plans so easily belied her wasn't the cold, calculating planning of a seasoned psychopath, but the ravings of someone who was pretending to know more about what she was proposing to do than she actually did. Severus recognized this from his own younger, more ambitious days. He'd said (and done) a number of cringe-worthy things, as had many of his similarly ambitious friends, but most of it had been posturing and bluster.

As he thought of what to say, he could feel Hermione's voice whispering through him, her pain muted and fading.

 _She was healing. Thank Merlin._

Well. He'd have to give her time, then. Luckily, years of service under the Dark Lord had helped him hone stalling to an art.

"How long have you been back in Britain? I didn't see any other former Death Eaters around. Have you been doing all of this alone with...Irt, was it?" Severus asked, his voice sliding from his servile Dark Lord's Right Hand voice to the deeper, authoritarian baritone he used while teaching particularly dunderheaded classes.

Isis looked chastened. "About a month," she admitted, her voice growing flustered, "Irt tried to stop me. I was supposed to stay in Egypt and finish my studies, but I didn't _want_ to. It's the _summer_. Do you know what the summer is like in _Egypt_? Let's just say that I would much rather prefer to be here. Anyway. It took quite awhile to find the right place to grab Harry. Apparently he lives in some sort of secret house most of the time. He's the key to all of this, you know."

"Because of the Dark Lord," Severus said flatly.

"Yes. I don't know why Irt thought this would be a bad idea. I had to invoke my Override just to get Irt to let me get on the boat. Nobody knows about me here, except for you, but I suspect that you'd be happier under a god than you'd be under some stupid old headmistress, yes?"

She giggled coquettishly and Severus had to force himself not to roll his eyes. It was obvious that she didn't seem to have much experience interacting with people, and that she just expected him to pledge himself to her. He wondered idly if she had ever really talked to someone who wasn't hired to take care of her. Draco had taken far too long to grow out of his own problematic behavior because he'd been raised by house elves and rarely interacted with anyone who was not "under" him other than his parents. It was the same sort of Pure-blooded arrogance that Severus had always despised. Once, he'd allowed himself to accept a bit of servility for the promise of more- connections, money, status.

But those days were long gone.

And the idea of having to grin and bow and scrape under this little tyrant was nearly more than he could bear.

'Come now, Severus. Surely you can keep your temper in check so that Hermione can heal properly,' he thought to himself.

"I may be swayed to join your cause...but only if you can tell me your plans. The Dark Lord extended this courtesy when...he enlisted me into his services, and so I feel that I should extend the same expectations to you as well. You say you wish to become a god. Exactly how will you accomplish this, and what do you ask of me?" Severus replied, his voice growing silky and persuasive, "and, more importantly, what do you have to offer me for my service?"

"Just like a serpent to ask for his due." Isis clicked her tongue, but she smirked at this and Severus knew that she would have been suspicious if he hadn't asked for anything in return. "Once I have the power, I can give you anything you like. Money, a high position in the new order of things….perhaps….a concubine or two?"

Severus glared at this, but Isis shot him a sly expression.

"Father always did say you were a stick in the mud. I didn't understand because I was little at the time, but now I get the impression that there was a good reason why he thought that way." She stopped stroking the darkness that made up the massive sun-bird's feathery chin and turned back to Severus, striking what Severus assumed she thought was a sexy pose.

 _You'd better not. You don't know where it's been_ , said a familiar mind-voice, and Severus nearly choked on absolutely nothing at all.

"While the sentiment is appreciated, I don't have much of an interest in old men," Isis said, obviously misinterpreting his reaction as interest in her.

"I...understand," Severus said, keeping his expression as emotionless as possible. He nearly had to chew on his tongue to keep back a snarky retort about how he wasn't interested in immature brats, either.

 _Severus, tell me that you've found Harry._ Hermione's mind-voice was urgent.

 _Indeed._ Severus tried not to make his mental voice sound irritated that she'd not asked after his own well-being. It was, after all, their mission to find Potter. _I have also found our mystery woman. She wants to recruit me to her cause._

Hermione's feral growl was at once monstrous and human.

"In any case," Isis was saying, finishing up a long monologue about herself that Severus couldn't bring himself to properly pay attention to, much less pretend to be interested in, "Irt tells me that a few of our escaped specimens have returned. One seems to have evaded her, but she's caught the most important one. This is a good thing, for the ritual requires a sacrifice."

Severus felt his stomach churn instantly. If it was Hermione…

"The mudblood bitch evaded me, but the spell on her is strong. She'll never be able to break it on her own," Isis snarled. "She'll be the first I deal with when I am remade."

Severus' mind went to Longbottom and Weasley, then, but he didn't have to wonder which it was for long. Irt appeared with that strange noise like sand falling, arms twisted like iron bars around Ron Weasley's struggling half-goat body.

"Delicious," Isis said, licking her lips and beckoning a _come hither_ finger at Ron. "Just in time for the proceedings to begin. Look upon me, Ronald Bilius Weasley, and love me."

Ron struggled, refusing to look at her, but he was panting with exertion as he tried to fight her command. Though she wasn't pointing a wand, Severus could feel some sort of energy leaving Isis' hand. Irt used one hand to tilt his head so that he was forced to shut his eyes.

"N-no!" he shouted as she walked over to him and placed a finger over his lips, tracing them.

Ron froze at her touch. She ventured closer and, before Severus could think what to do next, Isis kissed Ron on the lips and grabbed his manhood in one hand, causing his eyes to fly open. Immediately, they went half-lidded and Severus was unnerved to see that Isis' hand was now pumping something long and hard that he most definitely did _not_ want to see back and forth.

Ron's jaw went slack and Irt released him, stepping back and standing as though waiting for more instructions.

"Did you find the fat one?" Isis asked.

Irt shook a hooded head and then went back to waiting. The movements of Irt's body did not seem to be quite...human, and Severus found himself staring at the shrouded form of Isis' attendant instead. Something he'd read a long time ago prickled in the back of his memory, but it was fuzzy and Severus frowned again, trying to pull it to the forefront of his mind.

By now, Isis was leading a very aroused and compliant Ron towards a slightly raised dias that was set behind the massive perch that Harry-the-sunbird stood upon, alien eyes blinking at random as he waited for his master's signal.

"You poor beast," she crooned, pushing him back onto the silken cushions, "All you crave is the release that only I can give you."

"Yes, mistress, please," Ron gasped, as she lowered herself onto his furry haunches and proceeded to take his considerable length into herself.

As Ron moaned audibly, Severus, instead, moved over to Irt to stare at the painted eye stood out against the darkness of the hood.

"Hello," Severus said, trying to test the waters.

Irt did not react.

Severus waved his hand back and forth, but Irt did not move at all. Before he lost his nerve, he pulled the hood away with one hand.

Underneath were cloudy grey eyes, unnaturally white skin and a shock of black hair that Severus immediately recognized.

"Regulus Black?" he asked, more out of shock than anything.

The thing that had been Regulus Black did not reply. Severus could see the black ringed flesh of the rune carved into the Inferi's head to ensure compliance. But what truly horrified him was the glass implement that was strapped over his nose and blue lips like an aviator's mask.

It was full of a deep, crimson sand.

Severus had only seen SoulSand twice. The first time, had been when he'd visited Abraxas Malfoy's stately home with Lucius and had been shown an hourglass that contained the soul of a man who'd been executed in the fourteenth century for heinous crimes so dire that it was decided that it would be too dangerous for his soul to escape his body upon execution, so it was tied inside the hourglass, which was charmed to dampen the sounds of his tortured soul screaming for eternity. At the time, Severus had thought it was rather novel (and had half-believed that it was probably just colored sand and the story had been made up to scare him), but he soon realized that the Dark Lord was interested in more than just the punishment aspect of the substance. Later, when Severus had been among the group of Death Eaters called upon to a seemingly impromptu meeting, he hadn't realized why the Dark Lord had appeared to be so angry but also seemed simultaneously proud of himself. He'd mentioned that one of his followers had been unfaithful to him, but not mentioned the poor sap's name. Instead, he'd pulled a giant glass tube from a wooden box on the stage and proceeded to tell everyone in the room that this was all that a man amounted to without his body. An inhuman howl had risen from the box as he'd lifted it out, but it rose to an almost deafening roar as the Dark Lord had held it out to show everyone this cautionary tale. "You are my tools, don't you forget that, my Death Eaters, "Voldemort had crowed, once he had placed the glass tube back into the warded wooden box. "If I cannot use you as you are, I will find other ways to...ensure your service."

Severus would always remember Lucius' face that night when he found the older man puking in the loo. "That sick-ba-rguhhhh," he'd choked out before spewing the remaining contents of his stomach into the toilet.

Now, staring at Regulus' face, it appeared that Voldemort (or one of his followers with an interest in Dark Magical Augmentation) had removed the poor young man's soul and then somehow piped it back in using the SoulSand. The inferi didn't seem to be rotting, and Severus immediately thought back to some of the embalming processes that had been used in Ancient Egypt and still persisted to some extent in modern-day Cairo. Magical charms from that time had been said to be so potent that a dead body could be preserved almost perfectly against the elements. Some texts spoke of deceased royalty that suddenly died being treated as though they were still part of the daily routine for a year after initial death to "ease" them into the afterlife.

Regulus Black must have done something truly unforgivable to be placed in a state of eternal undeath and saddled with raising Voldemort's daughter.

The unfocused, dead gray eyes seemed to track his eyes for a moment before going listless again, and the sand buzzed in the glass tube as though trying to say something. Even though he knew that he should be stopping Isis from what she was doing, Severus stared, transfixed by the scarlet specks. If he strained his ears, he thought he could hear a voice from far away screaming his name in a dead man's voice.

There was a cry from the dais as Ron climaxed, and Severus instinctively turned his head back towards the source of the sound.

It was then that Regulus/Irt grabbed the hood out of Severus' hand and pulled it back over his head, which caused Severus to reel back in surprise. A second later, Hermione exploded out of the tree cover in a burst of feathers, claws and feral screaming, her claws trained on Isis.

"Foolish mortals! You're too late! You're _always_ too late!" Isis cackled as she produced a large, crooked bade and buried it into Ron's chest.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8: Bound by Bond**

Hermione slammed into Isis, knocking her off of Ron's limp body. She only had a moment to see how he lay on his back, his face a twisted in between pleasure and horror. The blade remained buried in his chest, and Hermione pinned Isis down, her teeth dripping corrosive acid onto the ground only inches from her face.

Isis merely laughed, even as Hermione snarled and her claws shredded Isis' robes at the shoulder.

"You stupid mudblood!" she spat. "You should have escaped while you had the chance!"

Her skin seemed to bubble, then, and Hermione scrambled back hurriedly as Isis began to grow and the massive sunbird that Harry had become began to shrink. Soon, Isis had grown to nearly twelve feet high, her skin gone the same fiery red as the sunbird's eyes with thick, black, veiny cracks interspersed down the length of her body. Flame seemed to pulse under her skin, the air around her body shimmering with waves of heat, and her robes quickly turned to ash, leaving her vaguely humanoid, though her limbs seemed just a bit too long. When she opened her eyes, they were a solid, oily black. A cape of oddly fluid-like feathers flowed out behind her in a black, jagged mass. She grinned, showing off a mouthful of shark-like, serrated teeth.

Hermione's ear flaps flattened back against her head and she hissed, spitting venom.

"I'm going to enjoy breaking you," Isis hissed back, and then, before Hermione could properly move out of the way, she swung a massive, fiery fist into the side of Hermione's muzzle.

* * *

Severus threw up a shield with his wand just in time to deflect a giant conjured knife that was flying at his face at an alarming speed. Regulus (Severus could not think of the brown-clad creature before him as Irt now that he knew the face under the mask) had pulled out a long, striped crook from his robes and had begun throwing all manner of spells at Severus, driving him back. It seemed less like he was trying to kill and more as though he was trying to get to his master. For some reason, knowing the identity of his attacker grounded him a bit, and he easily deflected the next hex. He'd actually dueled against Regulus before, back when they'd both been relatively new to the Death Eaters. There was nothing familiar in the mechanical casting stance that Regulus used along with the gold and black striped crook. Severus shuddered involuntarily to think of what had been done to the younger Black brother. With a well-timed Full Body Bind, Regulus finally dropped to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, and Severus kicked the crook away from his frozen hand just as he heard Hermione roar with pain.

Severus stumbled with pain as the echo of Hermione's injury tore through their bond. He let out a small cry of pain, twisting to run towards her even as he felt a few strands of energy slip into his head.

 _Severus. Please. Lend me your strength._ Hermione's mental voice wavered slightly, as though she was slightly torn. _Just for a moment. I don't have enough on my own._

 _How-_ Severus could feel tendrils of his own power drawn to hers, and then he simply _knew_ what she wanted. He suspected that she was feeling it as well.

 _Trust the bond. I won't let anything happen to you._ Hermione's mind-voice grounded him.

Closing his eyes, Severus sank to his knees, took a deep breath, and let his power flow into her. _I do. Crazy as it sounds, I trust you._

The effect was instantaneous. He felt his magic pour into her. Hermione roared, her body erupting in bright, chromatic fire, and Severus could feel his consciousness filling the flame, protecting her- strengthening her. Prismatic color danced over her body and her tail plates slid into a mace-like formation. She pulled it back like a whip and then slammed them into the burning side of the would-be goddess.

Isis screamed, steam pouring from the wound. Severus could see where her feet were beginning to burn the grass beneath her, and he became very aware of the fact that a forest was a very bad place for an uncontrollable fire to rage.

Severus sunk deeper.

He was standing in darkness, alone. Actually, he wasn't sure if he was standing, really. Up and down were the same as far as he could tell. A tiny glow appeared in the distance and Severus started towards it, his body moving in slow motion like a dream. Suddenly, he felt himself pulled into Hermione's head, and there she was beside him, her warm hand over his as what appeared to be a large screen played out the gory fight scene before them.

"You disappeared for a moment, there, Severus," human Hermione said, her face relaxing.

"Oh, did I?" Severus replied a bit absently, turning his head in time to see the Anoroth bury her teeth into Isis and inject her corrosive poison into the wound. "How are you able to do that and be here with me at the same time?"

"I've always been good at multitasking," Hermione replied with an arched eyebrow. "But seriously, don't you feel it? It's because of our bond. Because of _you_."

She nestled her head against his side with a hum of affection. Severus felt his face growing unnaturally warm, which was odd, since he wasn't exactly sure if he had a body at the moment.

She was still holding his hand.

Severus swallowed slowly. It had felt so natural that he hadn't noticed, not really. They both watched as tail spikes flashed, severing one of Isis' arms from her body with a fiery hiss. The resulting scream was drowned out by the Anoroth's victorious bellow. Severus squeezed Hermione's hand.

"I'm glad you're here with me," Hermione purred. Outside of their cocoon, Anoroth-Hermione was snapping at burning feet as the creature stumbled back, moaning in pain.

"All things considered," Severus said, inclining his head to indicate the blood and fire before them, "I feel similarly...glad."

"Will you stay with me? Until the end?" Hermione turned her head to look up at him, her eyes large and glowing in the gentle light around them.

"Anything for you," he breathed back, not realizing exactly when their noses had gotten close enough to touch.

He wasn't sure who moved first, but her lips were soft and hot on his and he moaned softly at the bliss of it.

"Perfection," he whispered, as she pulled away, smiling dreamily.

"Stay with me won't you?" she whispered back, pulling him down until he was practically on top of her.

"Anythi-" he started, and she silenced him with her lips once more.

* * *

The Anoroth had reduced Isis to a bloody torso that lay on the smouldering ground. Already, her legs and arms had gone rigid and gray.

"Please...please…" Isis whimpered, her blood dripping like magma from her wounds. "I just...I wanted to be…"

Hermione lunged forward only to find her way blocked by something large and black.

 _Hermione_.

The Anoroth stopped and blinked.

The black sunbird, greatly diminished in size, sat on Isis' chest, fiery eyes glowing green instead of orange.

 _She is mine._ Harry turned his beak to look at the wide, oily, black eyes as Isis stared at him, whimpering.

"Peck out her eyes!" Isis spat. "Do it! Bonded one!"

Harry opened his beak, and unbelievably, his voice came from the depths of the beast he'd become. "No."

Hermione stepped back, watching Harry warily, and sat on her haunches. Her earflaps fanned out in curiosity.

Harry turned back to look at Isis in the face, his beak opening to emit his voice from deep inside. "You forgot that this bond goes two ways. You took from me without my permission, so now, let me return the favor."

Before anyone could move, Harry stabbed his beak through Isis' chest, burrowing through fire towards her heart. Isis roared with fury, but she could no more stop him than he could have stopped her from the ritual while under the control of her magic earlier.

Harry pulled her heart free from her chest with a sickening squelching noise. It was black and red and brighter than a heart seemed like it ought to be. With a quick gulp, Harry snapped it down and swallowed it. Immediately, Isis went still, her body growing gray and brittle. The sunbird turned his head back to look at Hermione, his eyes achingly human in his inhuman skull. "I had to do it, Hermione...I'm so-" Harry collapsed forward in a cloud of inky feathers.

The Anoroth, too, swayed her head back and forth before collapsing on her side, rainbow scales fluttering into the sky as an invisible wind blew around her. There was a squeak from the bushes as a large puff of a flower bloomed out of nowhere and burst into the sky with a comical "pop."

* * *

Hermione opened her eyes, her shoulders prickling with goosebumps. She drew herself closer to something warm and familiar with a yawn before realizing that she was not only completely naked, but she was curled up on the dusty forest floor with…

"Severus?" Hermione's voice was hoarse from disuse, and she instinctively covered her mouth with her hand in surprise. _Hand_. _Her_ hand. She shook her hair, feeling it bounce around her head and laughed, looking up to see that Severus was looking down at her, his expression one of relief and tenderness.

"Here, you need this more than I do," he said, standing up and pulling his cloak from around his shoulders. He pulled her up with one hand and then secured it around her neck. Then, he pulled her wand from one of his inner pockets. "I think you might want to do the honors."

Hermione grasped her wand with a small cry of pleasure. Her fingers slid up the length of familiar wood and she immediately pointed it at the cape, wordlessly transfiguring it into a simple set of robes.

"You've always been better at that than I am," Severus said, looking rather impressed.

"Don't worry," Hermione replied conspiratorily, "I won't tell a soul."

"Ahem." A familiar voice cleared behind them and they both turned abruptly.

Harry was sitting on the stony torso that had been Isis, his body covered in a pile of black feathers, smiling sheepishly.

"A bit of dignity would be nice," Harry said, flushing with embarrassment.

Hermione pulled out her wand and transfigured the feathers into a loincloth.

"It's the best I could do with the limited material," she explained at Harry's indignant squawk.

"Here," Severus said, throwing Harry's wand to him. "If you don't like looking like a savage then feel free to do better, Potter."

Harry caught his wand, spun it in his fingers and then shrugged. "It'll do for now."

"Hermione!" Neville squeaked from behind a bush. "I...um...appear to need….er…" Neville squeaked again and ducked his head when he noticed Severus was standing next to Hermione and staring in his direction.

Hermione sighed and pointed her wand at the bush, which attached around his midsection. It looked silly, but it worked to preserve his modesty.

Severus went to toss Neville's wand, but Hermione grabbed it and walked it over to the Herbology professor with a tight smile on her face.

"Where's Ron?" Neville asked, looking around expectantly. "We got separated in the scuffle and-"

They all looked at the still form on the dias.

"Oh, Ron," Hermione said, her voice choked up with sudden tears. "How could she have done such a thing?"

Harry ran to his friend and pulled the knife from Ron's chest, pressing down his eyelids. He, too, had shrunk back down to his human size and shape. Hermione grabbed one of the pillowcases on the side of the dias and ripped it from its cushion, transfiguring the material into a white shroud. She and Harry covered their friend together, tucking the fabric around his entire body until they could only see the outline.

Severus, too, had his own mission. He made his way over to where Regulus lay on the ground. With a quick slicing hex, he cut through the tubes holding the glass facial mask in place. Red bits of SoulSand began to escape, floating upward as though they were lighter than air, which, of course, they were. At first, it was just a few bits here and there, but soon an entire swarm seemed to pour from the ruined body that lay at Severus' feet, spreading into the sky and disappearing.

A soft voice seemed to pour through the air, more of a whisper than a voice. "Thank you, Severus."

Severus cleared his throat. Sure, he was not one to get sentimental about these sorts of things, but Regulus had never been a bad sort, and he was horrified at what the poor man had been reduced to by Voldemort.

"Be free, Regulus," Severus whispered, turning his head only when he felt Hermione's fingers slip through his.

She watched the SoulSand escaping in silence, her hand squeezing his.

When it was all gone, Severus incinerated the empty corpse that was left before. "It's just an inferi without the SoulSand," he said bitterly, "I...it's for the best."

 _Don't worry, Severus. I understand._ Hermione's mind-voice filled him with warmth.

 _I didn't realize that this would be possible when you...reverted._

"It's a bond, Severus," Hermione said, standing up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.

Neville squeaked and Severus shot him a glare.

"It's not going anywhere," Hermione continued. "And neither am I."

Severus regarded her for a long moment. "Good."

* * *

In the end, the Aurors had to cordon of the entire forest. Luckily, most of the notes Isis left behind also left a fairly clear picture of what had happened. The stone bits of her body were placed in a containment tank in the Unspeakables Archive, though all testing showed them to be made of inert stone. There were a few other isolated incidents of magical creatures reverting to their human forms, but they were largely kept out of the papers. Ron Weasley was posthumously issued another Order of Merlin and buried next to the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch with an impressive headstone.

The rest of them returned to teaching, though it was hard without Ron's intermittent visits and hilarious jokes. Harry fell into depression and nearly committed suicide over feeling personally responsible for Ron's death, but Hermione convinced him to get therapy, and Harry worked through it, throwing himself into his job and as a father to his newborn son, James Ronald Potter.

Hermione and Severus, on the other hand, had a rocky start to their resulting relationship. Their bond meant that they often heard each other's thoughts and feelings at inopportune times, and they had a few large disagreements, (which were eventually worked out), though it required a fair amount of persuasively well-cooked meals on Severus' part and a fair amount of rare books on Hermione's part. In the end, they married in a small ceremony overlooking the Black Lake, their lives once again filled with peace and the knowledge that their connection, forged in magic and hardship would always bind them together.


End file.
